Departure

Meet Up

Norbert
arrives to pick me up 10 minutes early, and of course I’m far from ready. We end up
leaving for Sue’s house 45 minutes later. It’s okay, though, because Cynthia is working a
baseball game and doesn’t arrive at Sue’s house with the kids until 10 minutes after Norbert
and I arrive. Whew, perfect timing.

Sue and Cynthia drive Kaitlyn and me to the San Francisco international terminal. Kaitlyn
is in awe of the inside of the place, as I was when I first saw it. It’s a nice, large,
artsy building. And our trip hasn’t even started yet!

Virgin Airlines

I purchased the ticket from Continental, through Orbitz.com. But, I’m so glad
that the flight is operated by Virgin Airlines. The plane has a screen on the back of each seat,
with a remote and about 40 movies, 20 English and American TV shows, and 10 games
to choose from. Plus it has an in-flight navigator. Awesome. And the service is nice, too.
We each receive a durable plastic pouch that contains:

toothpaste

toothbrush

pen

eye cover

ear plugs

wet napkin

It also contains a donation envelope, if we want to contribute to their
Change for Children campaign.

The guy sitting in the aisle seat has a broken video system, so they find him
a new seat about an hour into the flight. A few hours later, all three video systems
in our row freeze, so they find new seats for Kaitlyn and me, too. She stays up the
whole time watching movies, but I only manage to watch two before I try
to get some sleep. I don’t get much. I leave my pouch in the other row, where I later
discover that a lady
has sprawled herself across all three seats. It is difficult to sleep without the
eye cover and ear plugs, especially since each time I shift positions I manage
to touch a button on the remote, causing my screen to come on and wake me. But I do
manage to sleep abut 3 hours.